friendly fire
by sllebswap
Summary: BelHaru TYL AU. If at first you do not succeed, then try, and try again. Much to Belphegor's annoyance, the woman just. Won't. Die. Haru just wishes that this crazy man would stop randomly popping into her life to attempt spontaneous murder.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** friendly fire

**Author: **sllebswap

**Characters/Pairing: **Miura Haru and Belphegor

**Type:** Continuous (InComplete)

**Genre:** General/Romance/Humor

**Word Count:** 1919

**Rating: **T (Contains content not suitable for children)

**Disclaimer:** Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn belongs to Akira-san.

**Summary: **TYL AU. If at first you do not succeed, then try, and try again. Much to Belphegor's annoyance, the woman just. Won't. Die. Haru just wishes that this crazy man would stop randomly popping into her life to attempt spontaneous murder.

**Chapter Last Revised on:** 23/04/2019

* * *

**Chapter 1**

* * *

"And that's why we need the both of you to work together to recover the artifact," Tsuna explained somberly, both Ryohei and Hayato flanking him as he sat behind his study desk and regarded the two most unlikely partners whom he intended to send out on the crucial mission.

Looking from the arrogant and cocky demeanor of the golden-haired male on the right to the fidgeting, nervous female on the left, the Decimo briefly wondered if he was about to make a huge mistake by putting the completely mismatched pair together on this assignment. Not only had the two never worked together before, they also happened to move in entirely different circles and therefore weren't even vaguely acquainted. Unfortunately, time was of the essence right now and there were no other viable alternatives to choose from at this last minute. If they had a problem with each other, then they would just have to sort it out amongst themselves, but Tsuna really hoped that wouldn't be an issue.

As usual, the Tenth was being too optimistic—overly so, in fact.

Belphegor, the only Varia Commander available to answer to the main Family's request in such a short window of time, lazily tilted his head in the direction of the doe-eyed woman who happened to be staring at him warilt—as she had been doing for the past fifteen minutes or so since they had been put in the same room. "While I understand why you require my expertise," the Storm Flame wielder drawled idly. "Who on earth is Gawky there and what is she here for?"

In response, 'Gawky' flushed with chagrin and hurriedly looked away from him with mortification.

"I- My- I'm Haru," the brunette stammered with embarrassment. "Miura Haru, desu. Nice to meet you, Belphegor-san."

It was the standard greeting that most Japanese used when meeting new acquaintances, but the Storm Prince of Varia was never quite interested in exchanging niceties, let alone do so with someone who seemed so dull and boring even from the first impression. He stared at the flustered, visibly embarrassed female and instantly felt irritated. Being of a rather attractive and significantly sought out male, the blonde could spot a potential fan girl from as far as a mile away and to make matters worse, she also acted like a ditz and an airhead.

Great. What was she here for again?

Belphegor completely ignored the woman in favor of scowling at the Decimo and his Guardians. "Is she supposed to be a convenient doorstop? Decoy? Distraction? Or just plain decoration?" the Prince demanded with appalling rudeness, never mind that the woman in question was gawking at him once more, this time with overt disbelief, not that he cared, of course. "If so, then I have to say that you lot have really lousy tastes in décor. Also, although I know that you main Family types usually bring along a full cheerleading squad and a marching band when embarking on one of your epic crusades, we Varia don't really require the same consideration, so I don't need the adoring presence of fan girl over there just to do my job."

Belphegor wasn't even looking at the gaping brunette as he motioned sharply to her with his thumb, and even though Gokudera seemed visibly amused from behind his boss, Sasagawa had his arms crossed against his chest and was shaking his head with a vague sense of rueful dismay and disappointment. The mission hadn't even officially begun and it was already off to a rather bumpy start. Standing beside him, his Storm Guardian counterpart snorted under his breath. This partnership was going to be an interesting one, to say the least, and also extremely hilarious for everyone else not actively involved in it.

And really, the stupid woman was partly at fault for this case of mistaken identity; Belphegor would have been less likely to go off on her like this if she had just quit her ridiculous and misleading charade in the first place—but that was probably something that the golden-haired European would realize eventually.

Meanwhile, the Tenth calmly observed the visibly irked Varia from behind his desk, momentarily keeping an inscrutable silence even as poor Haru sputtered with a mix of mortification and rising anger, her face growing bright crimson as she struggled to reach an acceptable middle ground between her conflicting feelings of humiliation and fury. Truly, she was still shocked to meet somebody so offensive and ill-mannered, especially since she hadn't even done a thing to provoke him in the first place.

"I'm not a fan girl!" the brunette finally gathered her enough of her wits together to snap out. "Hahi, you are an incredibly impolite person!"

Belphegor just rolled his eyes and sneered back with a subtle curl of his upper lip, hardly impressed by the woman's comeback. "And you are obviously unimaginative and boring. Stating the obvious now, are we? I can do that too." Turning his head back to look at the Decimo and his Guardians, he scowled accusingly at them. "Not the brightest crayon in the box, is she?"

The man was so unbelievably rude that Haru could only stare at him with her mouth open. It was not often that she was made speechless, but this man was obviously in a class of his own and he was successfully punching on every available button there was to push when it came to her. That was actually something quite amazing seeing that this was the first time they both had prolonged interaction with each other and already they were at loggerheads after all of fifteen minutes together.

Hayato could not hold it in anymore; he snorted and promptly earned the attention of everyone in the room.

"…you two are either going to really love each other or really hate each other after this, aren't you?"

It was just a rhetorical question made in jest, but the identical, appalled expression that both sported was so comical that the silver-haired Storm Guardian could not help but smirk with rising amusement.

"I'd _never_ like someone like him!" Haru declared emphatically, wrinkling up her nose for good measure.

Belphegor did not buy her vehement denial. "So says the one who was looking at me earlier like she could not wait to get into my pants," he remarked sarcastically, much to her infuriated glare.

"Excuse me?!" By now, Haru's voice had already climbed a few octaves higher than her usual pitch. The men in the main Famiglia all winced inwardly at the increasingly shrill tone. Haru, for all her constant attempts to curb her brash, impetuous manner and behave more demurely and ladylike instead, didn't always succeed in her efforts. Unfortunately for her, this time was one of those.

"Wonderful. You are hard of hearing too," Belphegor shot back with a tone overflowing with sarcasm. Haru scowled at him, whatever sense of goodwill and amiable friendliness long gone.

"You-You are such an a-ass!" the brunette stuttered, tripping over her tongue in flustered pique, as if she could not believe that somebody like him really existed. Belphegor chuckled in an extremely taunting and annoying manner. Meanwhile, their audience watched with varying degrees of interest.

"Perhaps we should make some amendments to our current course of action," Ryohei commented under his breath. "Those two are likely to murder each other if we leave them unsupervised. It is unfortunate that Lussuria-san already had a previous engagement to see to and is unable to lend us a hand this time around." Based on the location of the target, a combat-based fighter like the Sun Varia would have been more preferable than one with the Storm Varia's expertise, but it wasn't as if they had a choice anymore and there was hardly any time left to make any drastic changes in the plan.

"Or I can partner Haru instead," Ryohei offered, but Tsuna shook his head.

"Not possible," the Decimo rejected the idea with practical pragmatism. "De Villieres is an extremely paranoid individual; we're invited to attend this function with the explicit understanding that the entire Famiglia will be kept under extensive surveillance from the moment we enter the grounds until we leave it. As such, our actions cannot be left unaccounted for especially when the artifact goes missing."

Belphegor, who clearly heard Tsuna's explanation (and was also tiring of the woman's squawking), snorted and butted back into that conversation. "The man should just lighten up a little. What's a bit of friendly theft between allied Famiglias?"

Haru scowled at the rude and offensive blonde, still visibly miffed over his unwarranted attack on her just now. "There's no such thing as 'friendly theft,'" she muttered, clearly in a disagreeable mood.

Belphegor arched his brow, not that anyone could see it. "Oh?" he asked casually, making it quite clear that he could hardly care less. "In that case, there's always friendly fire for when problems like these refuses to resolve themselves. That's what I'm here for, right?"

The Storm Varia did not sound like he was making a joke at all, and Haru turned to stare at Tsuna.

"Is he always like that?" the brunette asked the Decimo in a confused, disbelieving manner, almost as if she did not understand what she had done to merit her Boss torturing her this way, expecting her to work alongside this obvious lunatic.

"Yes, he is," Gokudera answered cheerfully on behalf of the Tenth, looking quite amused in the process. Haru was understandably not as entertained.

Leaning forward slightly, Tsuna rested his elbows on the table and interlinked his fingers loosely together. He regarded Haru thoughtfully. "Do you have a problem working with Belphegor-san, Haru?" he asked gently. As usual, his compassionate demeanor and deceptively calming nature, coupled with those rich amber, Hyper Intuitive eyes that seemed to penetrate right into the very soul of anyone he looked at quickly worked to settle Haru's agitation and annoyance. The young woman knew that her friend and leader would not have requested this of her if he had any other choice, not to mention, this was an important assignment and she really wanted to do her bit for their clan.

"…No," she sighed at last, just as her new partner bluntly answered in the opposite manner.

"Hell, yes. I've a huge problem with this ridiculous arrangement," Belphegor shot back. "I can complete this mission all by myself. I don't need this deadweight hanging around me; no doubt she's just going to slow me down and be about as useful as tits on a bull. I don't need nor want an amateur greenhorn getting in the way of my work, so she can just sit here and paint her toenails for all I care."

He was being extremely insulting _and_ sexist, not to mention his simple comment promptly reversed all the positive effects of Tsuna's soothing. Haru looked quite furious by then, but since the Decimo really needed the two to at least get along well enough to complete the mission successfully, he cut in before murder could be attempted.

"Actually, Haru is extremely good at her duties," Tsuna explained simply. "Therefore, due to the compatibility of her abilities with respect to this assignment, she has been designated the mission leader for this job. I regret that the parameters have not been explained to you clearly, Belphegor-san, but you will be only taking a supporting role this time, serving as secondary precaution and guard detail once the artifact has been successfully retrieved."

* * *

_::tsuzuku::_

* * *

**Questions That I Would Like To Answer Before You Ask:**

I've always enjoyed the idea of Belphegor and Haru being randomly plunked together for a mission (and both being very unhappy about it), haha. Something like an 'enemies to lovers' trope combined with 'being forced together to work towards a common goal/get out of a hair-raising situation' is definitely the idea for this pair here!

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This was written a while back just for fun. It's not completed yet (_as usual_) but recently I went back to review what I've written out so far and have decided to start working on it more, hence I'm posting this first chapter. Do let me know what you guys think- hope you enjoy! :)

**xXxXxXxXxX**

Your reviews make me update faster; so please leave a comment if you like this fic!

-sllebswap


	2. Chapter 2

**Title:** friendly fire

**Author: **sllebswap

**Characters/Pairing: **Miura Haru and Belphegor

**Type:** Continuous (InComplete)

**Genre:** General/Romance/Humor

**Word Count:** 2426

**Rating: **T (Contains content not suitable for children)

**Disclaimer:** Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn belongs to Akira-san.

**Summary: **TYL AU. If at first you do not succeed, then try, and try again. Much to Belphegor's annoyance, the woman just. Won't. Die. Haru just wishes that this crazy man would stop randomly popping into her life to attempt spontaneous murder.

**Chapter Last Revised on:** 05/05/2019

* * *

**Chapter 2**

* * *

He had been staring at her with a perpetually offended air for the entire trip to the massive De Villieres property, and after two entire hours of feeling like a housefly trapped under the glare of an angry spider, Haru decided that she had just about enough.

"Hahi, will you stop staring at me?!" she demanded at last, no longer able to tolerate the creepiness of the Storm Varia's ominously silent scrutiny any longer. They had been dropped off at the edge of their target's property not too long ago by Hibari. Much to her dismay, the Cloud Guardian was so effing quick and efficient with his duties as usual that he had promptly dumped them in their expected positions at the exact time they were scheduled to be and had then gone off to the huge De Villieres mansion to play his part in this elaborately devised scheme—a scheme that Haru was beginning to have some doubts over its probable chances of success the more she got to think about it.

Unfortunately, it was a bit too late for second thoughts, since she was already literally at the mouth of the lion's lair, so as to speak, and, in the process, had somehow also been convinced to work with one of the most ridiculous choice of partners if any.

"You should be honored that I'm paying you attention," said partner retorted at last with an irritating sense of nonchalant arrogance. "Even though it's the sort of attention that a hunter would bestow upon an invasive alien species, but you should still be honored."

Haru twitched. Then she scowled at the blonde, whose burnished golden hair was startlingly apparent despite the fact that they happened to be just in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by endless stretches of woodlands in the middle of the night with only the full moon as their companion.

God, who was she kidding?

This entire operation was going to be a disaster; she just knew it already.

"I should have told Tsuna that I could handle this by myself," she muttered under her breath, though evidently, she was still not soft enough for her current companion heard her loud and clear.

He snorted derisively. "Don't kid yourself," he shot back as they both continued to trek on foot towards the entrance of the underground cavern where the artifact was presumably hidden. Yes, an honest-to-god underground cavern-slash-treasure-vault. Haru had been pretty incredulous herself when she first learned of the target's location, though her astonishment had been quickly shunted aside to deal with other bigger problems—like being told that she would have to partner up with Mr. Self-Centered and Maniacal over there.

Haru sighed, resigning herself to the inevitable fact that she would have to learn to work around the Storm Varia's offensive personality whether she liked it or not. "Believe it or not, I'm actually qualified to pull off this assignment on my own. Your presence just serves as a secondary precaution for in case something unexpected crops up."

"Well, isn't that the most stupidly optimistic way of seeing things," Belphegor mocked sarcastically. Things that could go wrong would always go wrong. That was the one golden rule that regularly never failed. "Can you even back up your claims?"

Haru bristled. "I can!" she insisted.

"Prove it," he challenged. "Fight me."

Haru, who had been all stirred up and ready to argue her case in the matter, faltered and balked. She also quickly turned her head to stare incredulously at her ridiculously incomprehensible partner. "What? _Now_?" she sputtered in surprise.

In response, he shrugged unconcernedly, though the increasingly disturbing smile that he sported revealed his true feelings of the situation. The man was obviously not quite right in the head, not to mention that he also seemed to have completely forgotten the reason why they were currently traipsing around in the semi-darkness of the Italian countryside whilst also trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

"Why not?" he actually dared ask, toying dexterously with a handful of gleaming, sleek scalpels between his narrow, adroit fingers in a distinctively threatening manner.

Haru frowned at him, appalled, not even paying attention to how he was trying to scare her. "_No_, Haru is not going to fight you. We still have a mission to complete and have you forgotten that we're supposed to be _sneaking_ into the target location right now?! Blowing up the countryside is hardly inconspicuous!"

Her comment made him pause in his tracks to look at her archly. "Such modesty you have. You really believe that you can force me to use my Flames?"

He was, of course, being a completely condescending ass as usual, something that Haru was quickly learning was the norm for him. She opened her mouth to retort but at last closed it again when she thought better of it. She shook her head firmly. "I'll not be goaded into a fight just because you want it to be so, desu. You don't get to manipulate me like that," she declared disapprovingly. "Hayato warned me that you were going to be unreasonable about this, so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that you're doing your best to fulfill expectations."

With that, the woman started to walk quickly once more, briskly pulling ahead of him and doing her best to ignore him—as if he was a mischievous child who needed to be disciplined.

Her naïve actions were almost amusing if they weren't so irritating.

Belphegor couldn't recall the last time anyone foolish enough to turn their backs on him had survived to do so again, and he also wasn't exactly in a mood good enough to start making an exception this time.

His fingers twitched minutely as if in response to his languidly murderous thoughts—if there ever was such an oxymoron—and within the blink of an eye, those dangerous blades that he had been toying idly with were suddenly hovering in the air around him, their razor sharp, glistening tips pointed at the undiscerning form of the woman still blithely walking ahead of him. It would take nothing but a thought on his part to send his favored choice of weapons slicing cleanly through the air and hilt deep into the foolish female's back; his Flame ability was amongst the strongest of its kind and he had honed it to such a point of exquisite precision that most of his enemies quailed with terror and dread when they were unfortunate enough to encounter him on the wrong end of the battlefield.

The fact that this small, mousy woman did not appear to comprehend the gist of the situation that she was in (not to mention his fearsome reputation) was both annoying and bemusing at the same time. He was nowhere near interested enough to indulge in his idle curiosity of her, though, and it was really untimely, but she was going to have to suffer an unfortunate accident very soon - or at least, that was what he would tell her Famiglia when he returned from the mission without her in tow-

"Haru knows that this might be a bit difficult for someone like you, but can you not just stand there and giggle to yourself and, I don't know, just get a move on already!" the woman's irritating harpy voice floated back to him from a fair distance away. He could see that she was still trekking determinedly towards their target location even as she was busy yelling at him - for someone who had been rather concerned about being discovered, she sure was making enough noise to wake the dead right now.

"-hahi, and what's with that fixation with your little metal toothpicks-"

He launched his _blades_ at her before she could finish her insulting remark, a small tic of irritation throbbing on his brow indicative of his growing ire. The absolute gall of the idiot woman, running off at the mouth and insulting his weapons like she had. _Little metal toothpicks! _She had no idea of the meticulous calculations and highly specialized workmanship that had gone into the design and creation of his sleek, custom-made scalpels, the expensive metallic hybrid-alloys that they were forged from, granting their aerodynamic yet Flame-proof abilities and deadly precise, razor-sharp edges-

Just then, his highly vaunted weapons, which were well on their way and right on target en route to the glaring bullseye (imagined) painted on the brunette's back, suddenly stopped midair no less than two meters away from said target. As if caught in an invisible force field, the blades hovered impotently in their place, malevolently glinting tips still pointed fruitlessly at their seemingly oblivious prey, and Belphegor scowled at the unexpected outcome of his attack. He swiftly attempted to recall his weapons, and was immensely displeased when he found that they would not budge.

What the _hell_ is wrong with this woman.

_Then,_ much to his increasing outrage, as if to further add insult to injury, his blades started to buckle under an unseen pressure, slowly giving into the strain of the immense force, only at last dropping soundlessly on the ground in balls of ruined, crumpled metal. He stared wordlessly at his utterly destroyed weapons. Meanwhile, the woman continued to stroll away from the scene of the crime without a care in the world (or so it seemed to Belphegor).

That was it; she was going to _die_.

This time, he wisely refrained from lobbing more of his blades in her direction and stalked edgily after her instead, his long legs carrying him quickly to her retreating form. He slowed briefly only to pick up the remains of his devastated weapons (here, he half-fumed, half-mourned the handful of utterly ruined pieces of metal) and then continued to stride towards the oblivious woman. He almost expected to hit the same force field that had stopped his blades from perforating the brunette but was mildly surprised when he encountered no such thing. Drawing up soundlessly beside the huffing female, he shot out his hand abruptly and grabbed her by the elbow, unceremoniously hauling her to a sudden stop.

"Woman," he barked fiercely. "What did you do just now?"

Haru, who had been taken by surprise by the blonde's sudden proximity as well as the abrupt sound of his sharp tone, tried to jump away from him instinctively, a startled yelp escaping her lips. She, of course, failed to take into consideration the fact that he had possession of her arm, and as a result of the conflicting movements, promptly lost her balance and would have ended up tripping over her own two feet once more if not for the grace of her ill-tempered partner.

The man in question was feeling more inclined to let her fall flat on her face than anything else, but withheld from the urge to do so in the interest of getting some answers. His lips curled in disgust at the blatant reminder that he had been bested (indirectly, of course) by this sort of clumsy riffraff and the fact that she seemed to have done it inadvertently did nothing to lessen his humiliation whatsoever. In fact, it only seemed to aggravate him more and Belphegor was fully determined to get to the bottom of this matter by hook or by crook.

Haru stared at the long-fingered hand that was currently holding her elbow hostage before lifting her gaze to frown directly at its owner.

"Hahi, why are you touching Haru?" she asked in a warily cautious manner. He sneered at her.

"Don't flatter yourself," he snapped. "You're about as attractive as the gum stuck under my shoe. And don't change the subject; what was that just now?"

His generous words of praise made her turn a deep, dull red. It was a rather unflattering shade on her complexion, he could not help but notice snidely.

"Y- y- you're more repulsive than a toad!" she sputtered angrily at last. "Even amphibians have more charm than you!"

He rolled his eyes. "I don't need to hear about your pathetic plebian mating standards." His grip on her tightened warningly. "How did you erect that force field?"

He was no stranger to fighting opponents with truly annoying defensive techniques and had met his share of force shield-users in the span of his illustrious career as a Varia assassin, but what made this case unique was the fact that he hadn't sensed any Flame being used in the creation of the force field let alone the Flame type, and the implications of that was disturbingly foreign.

It told him that either the woman was so adept at using her Flame that she could employ it without detection (a feat that he had never come across of before in the _entire_ span of his career as an assassin), or that she had pulled it off without using any Flame whatsoever (an utter impossibility that shouldn't even be considered).

Either way, this experience quickly told Belphegor that the female was nowhere near as weak and as useless as he had first thought her to be. Or rather, how she portrayed herself to be, deliberately giving others a false impression of her abilities or supposed lack thereof.

His wariness of her increased. This woman was wilier than he had first thought, and perhaps he should heed the Vongola Decimo and not underestimate his new partner any longer.

Haru glowered at him, not sure of his sudden interest in her, watching her closely with a type of regard that one would usually reserve for a dangerous man-eating beast.

"What on earth are you talking about?" she demanded, clearly not pleased with the brusque, accusing manner in which he was speaking to her. "What force field?"

Her act was quickly getting old, not to mention he was also feeling rather disgruntled and irritated with himself for being careless enough to fall for it. He scowled, shot her a dirty look, and then shoved the crumpled remains of his weapons at her. "Playing dumb only works before you destroyed my blades; are you really that stupid or just deliberately obtuse?"

Haru fumbled clumsily with the ruined metals, staring at them confusedly as she did so. It did look like the work of her- _Wait a minute. _

"Hahi, did you just try to assassinate Haru?" she immediately demanded to know, deeply outraged by his murder attempt.

Belphegor glowered back at her, almost looking equally aggravated by the fact that she was still very much alive and kicking.

"I wasn't _trying_," he snapped.

* * *

_::tsuzuku::_

* * *

**Questions That I Would Like To Answer Before You Ask:**

Completely forgot that it was Haru's birthday until I saw all the homages for our girl on tumblr, so I figured that I should update this chapter at least in honor of her! The poor thing isn't having a fun time of it right now, haha, but at least the tension and mystery (and also hopefully hilarity) is starting to ramp up!

Hope y'all enjoyed!

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Your reviews make me update faster; so please leave a comment if you like this fic!

-sllebswap


	3. Chapter 3

**Title:** friendly fire

**Author: **sllebswap

**Characters/Pairing: **Miura Haru and Belphegor

**Type:** Continuous (InComplete)

**Genre:** General/Romance/Humor

**Word Count:** 3773

**Rating: **T (Contains content not suitable for children)

**Disclaimer:** Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn belongs to Akira-san.

**Summary: **TYL AU. If at first you do not succeed, then try, and try again. Much to Belphegor's annoyance, the woman just. Won't. Die. Haru just wishes that this crazy man would stop randomly popping into her life to attempt spontaneous murder.

**Chapter Last Revised on:** 07/06/2019

* * *

**Chapter 3**

* * *

Haru opened her mouth to retort, but for a few seconds, words eluded her. Then she snapped her mouth shut and wrenched her arm free from his grip, at the same time shoving the destroyed scalpels back at him. Her patience was spent. SPENT.

Her hand shot out, grabbed the lapels of his jacket, and hauled him down to her eye level. The woman glared hard at this _idiot_.

"Excuse me, Haru is getting really tired of your tantrums," she snapped. "Please behave like a proper human being or-"

"Or what?" Belphegor cut in with silken aggressiveness, not even looking the least bothered by her unexpectedly explosive reaction. If anything, he pushed his face closer, deliberately intimidating, his voice softer, his demeanor dangerously still. "_Or_. _What_?"

She was startled by his confrontational demeanor, but she managed to keep her cool. "Or you can leave right now because Haru would rather do this on her own than put up with an unreliable teammate. This is what you wanted from the start, right?" She released him and even had the gall to make a shooing motion at him. "Wish granted, you can go. Hahi, go, go."

She must be _kidding_ if she thought that she would be easily rid of him now. And what was he, some pesky housefly for her to chase away?

"I'm not going anywhere until you compensate me for the blades that you ruined, most preferably with your life," he retorted, and she was so surprised by his demand that she gaped at him, almost speechless once more.

"Hahi? Your blades were ruined because you tried to kill Haru, desu! Why must Haru pay you anything back?" she argued back, and could hardly believe that she was haggling over this ridiculous topic with this most ridiculous man.

"Tch, you're still alive, so of course this is all your fault," he replied so naturally her mouth fell open. She looked so outraged that a muffled squawked escaped her. And why was she bothering with this unreasonable person, anyway?

The brunette threw her hands up and started to turn away. "Hahi, do whatever you want. But I'll tell you this now; Haru is not afraid of you!"

"You should be afraid," he drawled with that infuriatingly sharp smile, and while she was not aware, he was also studying her closely.

Haru wisely opted to ignore the lunatic. The twitching brunette gritted her teeth and marched resolutely forward, only briefly checking the tracking coordinates on her specially designed wristwatch to make sure that they were on the right trail. Without another word, she briskly forged ahead, with renewed determination to complete this damn mission as quickly as possible before she ended up throttling the ally behind her.

Belphegor caught up to her easily in a few long, fluid strides. Then he shadowed her in the most deliberately annoying manner, looming like a golden-haired death god. In response, Haru just ignored him harder. They were fast reaching the target point where they were going to have quieter and even more inconspicuous to avoid detection, and Haru wasn't about to be the one to cause their mission to fail even before it began.

They were both dressed in black, and Haru's jacket even came with a hoodie to conceal her chocolate brown hair. She didn't think her hair was the most obvious problem at the moment, though. Narrowing her eyes at the man beside her, his crowning glory glowed like a beacon in the semi-darkness of the starlit night.

They both came to a brief stop at the edge of the vault location, automatically crouching behind dense foliage to survey the parameters and regain their bearings. The clearing before them was deceptively plain and devoid of security. There wasn't any sign of life or visual indication that somewhere here laid the treasure trove of the eccentric De Villieres Famiglia; there wasn't even what looked like an entrance to a hidden lair, anywhere. If not for the fact that Hibari had been the one to verify that there indeed existed a certain treasury in this area, Haru would have been hard pressed to believe that such a structure existed here, literally in the middle of this thick, forested land.

Now, to figure out how to gain access was the next problem, but one whose solution played to Haru's strength. Her ability was somewhat…_unique_ in the way that did not make her a suitable combatant in battle, but when it came to defense, there was no one better.

As Belphegor had inadvertently figured out.

She did not like to be flashy or outstanding, not during a covert mission at least, preferring to fly under the radar to get what needed to be done completed as quickly as possible and avoid detection, but that was not the case for her unlikely partner, it seemed. The man's demeanor all but loudly screamed smugness and swaggering confidence, which led her to wonder just which part of him was the swift and silent assassin he was supposed to be.

Actually, come to think of it, there really wasn't anything assassin-like when it came to all the commanders of the entire Varia division…

"Hahi, you're on diversion," Haru instructed in a whisper, trying to be as quiet as possible. Belphegor snorted beside her.

"Why must I? Who are you to start bossing me around?" he asked almost in the same volume under his breath, though it was impossible to ignore his obvious annoyance. She stared at him, incredulous.

"Haru assumed that you would rather contribute to the mission and be a bit useful," she muttered, deeply unimpressed by the weaselly nature of her capricious partner. Belphegor smiled at her open disdain.

"I'll kill you," he promised silkily.

Haru was paying him no attention anymore, unfortunately for him. She was scanning their surroundings intently, trying to figure out how to get into the hidden vault. It definitely had to be underground…

She snapped out of her thoughts and frowned at Belphegor abruptly. "Well?" she demanded, a bossy bag of goods she was. "What are you still here for? Hahi, go, go. Are you only good for decoration?!"

His fingers twitched, as if he was trying not to reach over and commit murder. There was something about his expression that must have cued her to his homicidal thoughts, but instead of shrinking away in alarm like a wilting violet, she just gave him an irritated stare.

"What? There's no more time for dramatics, desu! We're already behind schedule so you're going to have to lose your marbles after we've done what we need to do here-"

He was being…_nagged_, it took him a beat or two to realize, mainly because he was not in the habit of being nagged by anyone and was therefore nonplussed by this entirely vexing situation. Then, Belphegor promptly responded in the only manner that made the most sense to him. There was a reason why people tended to try their hardest not to annoy him, since those who did ended up not living very long afterwards.

"Die." His blade flashed towards her again, this time aiming at the jugular, but somehow, he wasn't as surprised anymore when the razor sharp, gleaming tip of his knife stopped short once again a foot from its intended target. He scowled, but was now starting to grow admittedly more curious than furious. What the hell was this woman made of.

Haru frowned as well.

"Will you stop fooling around already?"

He huffed and backed off. For now. The classic, straightforward way of 'stabbing first, ask question later' had not worked, so obviously he would have to reassess the situation and try some other method. His pride as an assassin had been thoroughly offended. A woman who won't die no matter how hard he was trying to kill her? All the other assassins would laugh at him if they knew.

The blond turned away from the infuriating woman and focused his attention on something else instead. He rose quickly and started to stalk away, but she snatched his sleeve and hauled him back before he could go.

"Your hoodie and mask, desu!" she hissed like an offended chipmunk. Weren't assassins supposed to be covert? What kind of assassin was he, anyway?

A lethally good one, that was what kind. Skillful enough to never leave any witness behind. There was no need to be covert if all who could identify him was dead, anyway.

This, unfortunately, was no assassination mission. And Squalo would have kittens if they failed this assignment because of him. That old man would harangue him nonstop for sure and that was one annoying outcome he would like to avoid.

Grumbling, Bel snatched his hand away and yanked the hoodie over his crown and golden head. He pulled the face mask over the bottom half of his face as well, and then skulked off. Haru hastily did the same as well, but she hunkered down where she was and watched her mission partner casually saunter towards the clearing, summon his Flame, and then promptly light the entire surroundings on _fire_.

She tried not to facepalm.

_Hahi, what is he doing?_ She screeched in her mind as the entire clearing was engulfed in a roaring sea of fire. Standing apathetically in the middle of the raging Storm Flames, the man had the gall to catch her eyes and _shrug_. Wasn't she who had requested for a diversion?

It was the most excessive diversion, ever. Too excessive! And he was so blatant about it! Was he trying to burn down the whole forest? Why don't he just use the flames and scrawl 'Vongola was here' across the entire De Villieres property while he was at it? Haru was trying not to twitch. This was the _absolute_ last time she was going on a mission with this guy, that was for sure.

And then there was no time for her to jump up (and presumably yell in outrage), because out of a sudden, from what had previously been a flat expanse of clearing, an opening emerged from the ground like a hidden trapdoor, and out spilled the defenders of the Famiglia's treasury, swarming out furiously to take out the invaders.

All that action suited the Varia just fine. The blades between his fingers materialized like deadly ghosts, and he was grinning with vicious anticipation behind that mask. Haru changed her mind and stayed hunched behind her bush, grudgingly acknowledging that the man was finally being useful. The Varia assassin surged forward, ever ready to exercise that hyper aggression, never too far from the surface, on his unwitting opponents.

In the ensuing chaos, Haru waited intently for a lapse in the defenses, and when she spotted her chance, the brunette stealthily slipped down the momentarily unguarded opening, quickly and quietly as a wraith, leaving the rest of the defenders surging out to Belphegor, who was by now having such a ball of a time that his demented chuckles could be heard echoing everywhere.

Haru tried not to shiver at the sadistic, cackling laughter of her demonic teammate gleefully going to town outside and focused fully on her task at hand instead. She shot down the darkened passageway like an arrow and darted surreptitiously from shadow to shadow, determined to stay undetected for as long as possible while everyone else was rushing out to repel Belphegor.

She was successful up to an extent, swift footedly and determinedly launching a surgical strike right at the heart of this hidden De Villieres treasure vault. There was still the artifact to find and retrieve, and until she personally laid eyes upon it, it wasn't even a confirmed fact that the object was physically on site. Even though Tsuna and all the other Guardians had deduced by simple process of elimination that the item was most likely here, it was still hard to ascertain for a fact since no one had seen the thing for a good _three centuries_ already.

The brunette's plan was simple. This hidden vault had not turned out to be as straightforward as they had initially hoped. There were enough guards here to adequately provide security to defend a small bank. Of course, most of the guards were off duking it out with a certain blood crazed Storm Varia at the moment, which made Haru's sneaky entry a breeze. The layout of the place seemed clear enough to her, with long narrow, twisting tunnels accompanied by dim, ominous bunker lights. The place also looked old, like it had been built a long time ago in absolute secrecy and had never been updated ever since.

Mental assessment complete, Haru concluded that there should be a central station, and so she started to look for it unerringly. It would be a lot easier to orientate herself if she started searching from there.

It did not take her long to finally locate the room. Unfortunately, she was not alone. There was one last guard there, and he looked shocked, and then infuriated by her presence. He hissed out a long string of Italian and snatched up a communication device, looking like he was about to divulge her presence to his brethren. Haru rushed forward before he could do so.

"Hahi, you can't do that!" She lunged over, did not even recoil or blink when the man whipped out a gun and shot pointblank at her. Like with Belphegor's blades, the bullet came to an absolute stasis just a mere foot away from her, the superheated metal visibly buckling under an invisible pressure before it abruptly dropped to the ground. Her opponent barely had to time to goggle in shock before the small, lithe female darted in close, a pale, gloved hand flashing out behind him and chopping down sharply with the blade edge, striking precisely on the back of the nape and knocking him out in one fell swoop.

"Sorry!" Haru felt bad, but at least the man would live. She went on to take a quick look around once she confirmed that the man was down for good. The station was a simple one, and the main panel grabbed her attention. There were rows of unlabeled switches and mysterious buttons blinking there, but what caught her eye the most was the biggest one sitting right in the center, polished to a shiny luster and painted an attractive, screaming fire engine red.

She had no idea what it was supposed to do, but it wasn't as if the situation could be any worse. And they were pressed for time. The field of flames outside had already lit up the whole section of this forest and alerted the De Villieres that something was afoot here. Backup would be arriving soon, so Haru had nothing to lose. She reached over and pounded down firmly on the knob.

At first, nothing happened. Haru was half expecting wailing sirens and defensive automatons to spring to life, but that did not happen. Just as the woman was about to think that the button was a dud after all, the ground all around her started to rumble and shake, dislodging decades of dust in some parts of the ominously creaking ceiling.

Too late she remembered that she was currently underground; if this entire place was to collapse-

She backed away and started to make plans to temporarily evacuate, and promptly ran into another person. The woman was so startled, she nearly jumped a foot in the air. Twisting around like a spooked cat, she was promptly met with the sight of an unamused Belphegor. An unamused, faintly blood splattered Belphegor. It seemed like he had already done away with the defensive contingent for the vault.

"What did you do," he barked irritably even as their surroundings crumbled precariously around them.

Haru scowled. This guy really had a way of making a girl feel special. "I was locating the objective."

He snorted. "Wonderful. Here I thought you were down here having tea and biscuits with our hosts. Are you planning to get around to locating the objective sometime this decade?" he asked sarcastically.

Her brow twitched violently. "Hahi! I'm on it; stop nagging! Are you an old man? Even my grandpa does not nag as much as you!"

Belphegor looked so comically affronted then, but Haru was in no mood to entertain his ego. She had work to do. The woman pushed past him and headed towards the door of the station. She poked her head out quickly to observe the passageway that stretched before it.

Then she blinked in surprise. Unveiling right before their eyes was the gaping mouth of yet another hidden entrance, revealing yet another secret level to this deceptive underground vault. The entire bunker stopped shaking and tremoring once the thick, blast proof metal wall panel finally slid opened. And then it was deathly silent.

Haru coughed and turned to stare pointedly at Belphegor.

"See, I knew what I was doing."

"That would have been believable if you didn't look so surprised just now."

The brunette was a bit flustered at being called out like this, but she held her tongue and trotted swiftly down the secret passageway. Unsurprisingly, all the traps immediately started to activate upon her intrusion. An insidious shower of poisoned arrows. A mass volley of gunfire. A vicious storm of spiked lances. An entire corridor of giant, swinging axes. Each and every one of the vault's defenses stopped short before their mark, falling to the ground ineffectively. Haru did not even had to dodge, and continued to advance unerringly.

Belphegor was increasingly intrigued.

"You're certainly a rather strange meat shield," he commented from behind her, and she stiffened.

"Hahi, why must you say it like that?"

"Have you walked straight into a bomb before?" he continued to ask. "What about a nuclear meltdown? Will you survive a decapitation?"

The annoyed woman suddenly came to a stop and turned her head to glower at the rude male.

"Do you think I'm a cockroach?!" she sounded so peeved and looked every bit as well, and that amused him enough that he was smirking nonstop again. She was unexpectedly entertaining.

"Are you sure you want me to answer that? And you're not replying to my questions," he drawled.

She decided to ignore him again. Turning back, she scanned her surroundings and started forward once more. They were running out of time and Haru was immensely vexed that she kept getting distracted. It also seemed like they had exhausted the defensive capabilities of the vault, as the entire tunnel fell eerily silent, and the two could feel themselves descending deeper and deeper into the ground as they ventured further into the long, dimly lit pathway.

Eventually, the cold, narrow, hand hewn stone passage widened abruptly into an incredibly large cavern that was dim and damp. To add to the sudden, disorienting space gaping before them, the weak lighting was not enough to penetrate the void and very soon, they both could not see a thing, not even their own hands.

"Belphegor-san," Haru spoke up then, making the decision that made the most sense. "Lights, please."

The blond behind her paused at her request, and then silkily asked. "Do I look like a fucking Ikea lamp to you."

"Haru can only wish," she mumbled under her breath. At least the lamp wouldn't be so annoying.

Her comment must have been heard, for she could sense him twitch behind her, followed by what _sounded_ like another assassination attempt.

"Hahi, did you just try to kill me again?" she asked, stopping abruptly. The annoyed '_tch'_ behind her said it all, and Haru started to get annoyed, as well. "How many times are you going to do this? I already said it won't work; you're not the brightest, are you?"

"Bright enough for you to beg me to light up your pitiful plebian life," he snapped back, which ruffled Haru's feathers' something worse.

"Excuse me, when did I _beg_-"

Her heated, aggravated whisper was cut off by an abrupt, echoing rumble that vibrated warningly through the air. The two tensed, argument ceasing.

There was also a pungent smell of sulphur…and brimstone that suddenly permeated the air. It was almost suffocating, nausea inducing.

Most importantly, there was something strange about this place…and they were definitely _not_ alone.

Then the cavern abruptly burst into _light_.

Orangey, bright, fiery light.

Overwhelming heat. Dizzying flames hot enough to melt _iron_. Black, choking, smoke.

Haru had to blink rapidly; her eyes were watering so much. Then she gaped in disbelief at the huge shadowy blob standing out in sharp relief against the backdrop of the hellish sea of fire. It was as if they were suddenly standing in a scene right out of Dante's Inferno. It was hard to comprehend what was happening.

The humongous, shadowy blob, built like a small, ugly mountain of scales sitting right in the middle of the cave, _moved. _

Haru froze, barely croaking.

"Hahi, are you seeing what I'm seeing?"

Beside her, her companion grunted, finally out of snark for once.

That monolithic beast glared at them with slit pupiled eyes filled with nothing but bloodlust and fury. Rearing onto its stout hindlegs, it threw its head back and gave out a deafening roar that shook the entire cave.

Ears ringing, Haru started to understand _why_ the systems in the De Villieres vault was so old and outdated. There was no need for any fancy defensive systems when one's treasury was being guarded by a freaking _dragon_. How did they even find one? Had it always been here all along?

"Hahi, is this even for real?" Haru was yelling louder than she realized; her throbbing eardrums were still not recovered from that terrible screech the legendary reptile had just given out. "A dragon. _A dragon, desu?_!"

_Great_. This woman just had to lose her shit now. And there was no time for anything else, for the gigantic lizard turned its muzzle towards them, gave them a very narrow, _mean_ stare, and opened its mouth once more.

A huge orange ball of flames came shooting out of its slavering jaws like a thick, viscous spray of napalm fire, and in the face of impending death ala overly crispy flambé-d human, the Storm Varia thought fast; he grabbed the woman and shoved her unceremoniously to the front. Haru shrieked in outrage the moment she figured his intent.

"Hahi! You're _dead_ when all this is over!" she yelled, annoyed by his casual use of her. He was unimpressed by her threat.

"You're very noisy for a meat shield."

"DEAD. YOU'RE DEAD, DESU!"

* * *

_::tsuzuku::_

* * *

**Questions That I Would Like To Answer Before You Ask:**

I think I may be having way too much fun with this scenario, lol. Belphegor and Haru on a mission together is more amusing than I thought possible!

Hope you guys enjoyed! :)

**xXxXxXxXxX**

Your reviews make me update faster; so please leave a comment if you like this fic!

-sllebswap


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